appending a file

circuit_girl · 09-30-2006, 04:34 AM

I am building a simple program in perl that takes information from a web page form I have and appends it to a file(database). The program is just supposed to add the id number # last name # first name from the information I enter on the webpage. I can not get it to write the the file. I am trying to learn how to write to files and pull info from them.
Note: no changes are ever made to the file. except for once there were to # signs.

I can not figure out my bug can anyone point me in the right direction.

Code:

#!/usr/bin/perl
print "Content-type\:text/html\n\n";

print "<html>";
print "<head><title>New Bowler Added</title></head>";
print "<body bgcolor=yellow text=brown>";

$str=$ENV{QUERY_STRING};


($str1, $str2, $str3) = split (/&/, $str);
($discard, $id)      = split (/=/, $str1);
($discard, $fname)   = split (/=/, $str2);
($discard, $lname)   = split (/=/, $str3);

#Do not get this in the notes it is like this but it is compiling with errors
#open file ">bowl1.dat";
open (file, ">bowl1.dat");
print (file "$id#$fname#$lname\n");
close (file);

print "<p><h3>You just added $fname $lname with ID number $id to your bowling database.</h3></p>";
print "</body>";
print "</html>";

Code:

0001#B#Tom#911#9#114
0002#T#Mark#625#3#231
0003#F#Tony#0#0#0
0004#S#Evan#125#3#52

circuit_girl · 09-30-2006, 04:34 AM

sorry that second code block is the file it is writing to.

bulliver · 09-30-2006, 10:09 AM

Quote:

open (file, ">bowl1.dat");
print (file "$id#$fname#$lname\n");
close (file);

Try:

Code:

open(FILE, ">> bowl1.dat");
print FILE "$id#$fname#$lname\n";
close(FILE);

">" will overwrite your file.
">>" will append to it...
By convention, Perl uses UPPERCASE for file handles.

circuit_girl · 09-30-2006, 03:17 PM

I tried that already. There is something wrong with the print statement. I can print to the screen but it is not printing to the file. The file stays the same. Any other suggestions or Mods I should make.

ciotog · 09-30-2006, 10:39 PM

You could try using the IO::File module instead. It makes manipulating files somewhat easier.

http://search.cpan.org/search?mode=m...query=IO::File

cramer · 09-30-2006, 11:06 PM

Code:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use warnings;
use strict;

#Filename
my $datfile = "bow11.dat";

open(HANDLE, ">$datfile")||die "Opening $datfile : $!";
print HANDLE "$id#$fname#$lname\n";
close(HANDLE);

File handles should always be in CAPITOLS to avoid conflicting with perl names etc. Also you might consider using CGI.pm to make it easier to output html and you can then use a form (much better) then instead of passing info using a query string.

ciotog · 09-30-2006, 11:12 PM

What error messages are you getting, anyway?

paulsm4 · 10-01-2006, 12:29 AM

cramer -

Upper case is merely a convention. A *good* convention to follow ... but certainly not a requirement.

And the spelling is "capital" ;-)

All -

Dumb question on my part: but have you guys checked file permissions yet? Specifically, does the Apache user have write permission on the file (and perhaps directory) in question?

Just a thought .. PSM

makyo · 10-01-2006, 11:00 AM

Hi, circuit_girl.

The posts from paulsm4 and cramer point you in the correct direction, if not now, then certainly for the future.

It is a rare script that uses open but does not check for the return status. In fact, in Damian Conway's Perl Best Practices, he says that all open, close, and print statements should be checked. I think most people do not check after each print, but that may depend on how important your code is.

Best wishes ... cheers, makyo